Chronicles of Jonathan Tibbs 1: The Never Hero (42 page)

Embarrassed by her own choices and angry at herself at the same time, one emotion fed the other in a vicious circle.

Never make this mistake again,
she thought.
Every time you cringe, every time you remember, just repeat it, ‘Never make this mistake’.

Some time passed, she eventually had a healthy looking stack of pancakes on the counter. She hadn’t tried one yet, she just kept going. It helped to keep her mind busy. At least until she ran out of batter.

Hayden and Collin were up before Jonathan. They didn’t appear to have lost as much sleep over last night’s debacle as she had. For a moment, it reminded her of breakfast commercials where the entire family smells Mom cooking and slowly made their way to the table in pajamas with uncombed bed head. They were endearing in a way, like children.

“This is new,” Collin said, watching her.

She nodded but stayed focused on what she was doing. Hayden yawned, then gave a look like he’d remembered something important.

“So, did anyone else dream that Jonathan kicked Grant’s ass last night?”

Paige struck the pan with her spatula.

Collin gave Hayden a dirty look. “Seriously, bro, read the room.”

“No, it’s okay,” Paige said. “It was the one part of last night I look forward to remembering.”

She could hear his footsteps then, Jonathan coming down the stairs. Paige took in a deep breath in anticipation. All she wanted was to give him the apology she’d been too upset to express the night before, to make sure he knew he wasn’t responsible. Was it really all on her somehow? Was Grant her responsibility?

She noticed his footsteps had stopped, like he’d gotten halfway down the stairs and hesitated. Was he so unsure if he wanted to face them? The memory of him humiliated, trying to excuse himself at the bar, flashed through her thoughts again and she cringed. She was relieved when the footsteps resumed and he was there, standing in the living room, looking like he’d been hit in the face with a softball.

“As I was saying,” Hayden commented idly, “couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy.”

Jonathan, taking them all in, looked unsure of himself. Unsure of what she couldn’t be certain. When he looked to her and the scene in the kitchen, his features changed. She thought he looked ashamed somehow; then he approached her slowly, like he was afraid that if he moved too quickly he would frighten her. She couldn’t stand it; his silence, his slow movements. Whatever was going on in his head, she could tell, was weighing heavily on him.

When he stood next to her and still looked like he didn’t know what to say, she felt like she was going to start sobbing. She’d been crying off and on all night, it was all too easy to start up again. She reached out to touch his face, below the purple mark that Grant had left. Then she worried it might be tender and pulled her hand back.

“I’m just so sorry, Jonathan,” she said, a sob escaping. “I feel like an idiot. He was so terrible to you.”

She hugged him then. She didn’t care if she was being ridiculous, or if Hayden and Collin were watching. He seemed to stiffen for a moment, caught off guard by the sudden affection, but then he melted and embraced her back.

“You don’t need to apologize for anything,” he said to her quietly, so Hayden and Collin didn’t hear. “I’m just glad you aren’t afraid of me.”

The way he’d moved so slowly, the way he’d seemed to be relieved that she’d hugged him, it made sense then. He’d thought that she might see him differently somehow. After all, it wasn’t like him to fight. If someone had crossed the line with him two months ago, he never would have thought violence an option; then again, two months ago she didn’t think he’d had a line to cross. Still, even when he'd been angry in a way she had never seen him, he hadn’t let go; he’d pulled himself back. It was losing that grip that would have made him into what he was so afraid she would now fear.

“No, of course not,” she said. “I made pancakes and you’re eating them.”

“All I’m saying is,” Collin said, “you can’t always spot the crazy ones. Sometimes crazy just strikes and no one sees it coming. Don’t beat yourself up about it.”

They sat around the table eating. Jonathan hadn’t expected it, but Paige wasn’t stoically suppressing her feelings regarding Grant. She’d seemed a bit embarrassed when everyone, even Hayden, admitted to not having liked the guy from the get go. That had been overshadowed by her relief when all three admitted that they never had any suspicions that he was a nut case, let alone dangerous.

“Seriously, when I was in high school I worked at a video store,” Collin said. “One day, this guy I’d worked with for months just loses it, starts talking about how aliens have been watching him. How they’re plotting to take him back to the mother ship. I had to call his mother to come take him to a shrink. He’d been perfectly fine the day before, just like any other day.”

“Ever see him again?” Paige asked.

“Yeah, three weeks later he came back to work, but he was different,” Collin said sadly. “Apparently his brain had just turned on him one day. The three weeks he’d been gone he’d spent with a doctor trying to get his prescriptions strength adjusted so he could function. It scared the hell out of me, still does really, how his mind had just decided not to make a certain amount of some hormone one day, and suddenly he was someone else entirely. That our personalities are so fragile; it’s disturbing.”

Jonathan had been listening to his friends discuss Grant’s strange behavior with a mixture of emotions. He felt such loyalty from them; they hadn’t considered a word of what Grant had suggested. The very notion that the government was watching them had immediately led them to the conclusion that Grant was paranoid, crazy, and belonged in a psych ward. At the same time, he felt guilty, because they trusted him so much that they didn’t realize the man hadn’t been paranoid.

“I keep thinking,” Paige said, “it makes sense now that the army discharged him. I bet he had some kind of an episode or something. I always thought it was weird that he never told me why he’d been let go early. Maybe he was getting disability for it? That would explain how he had enough money not to worry about a job.”

Paige’s theory fit her knowledge. The pieces were falling into place differently for Jonathan. Grant was discharged two days after he’d been in the hospital. He’d been taken off assignment because he was an available soldier already in a position to get information the government wanted. He hadn’t needed to worry about work because he’d still been on the government payroll.

“What do you think, Jonathan?” Paige asked. “Why did he fixate on you.”

Jonathan shrugged. “I’m not sure I want to know.”

It wasn’t a lie. Until he knew what the people watching him hoped to gain, he had no idea what to expect, and little hope that it would make his life any less complicated.

After breakfast Jonathan headed to the garage. Now that he had transportation, crappy as it might be, he didn’t have to bus everywhere. When he got there, he found the garage door wide open and motorcycle gone, just an empty space next to Collin’s Suzuki. For a second he thought it had been stolen, but it would be ridiculous for a thief to take his wreck when Collin’s bike was sitting right next to it. He could hear the familiar sounds of classic rock playing next door.

When he approached Leah’s driveway he saw that she had the bike out and was fitting the demolition bar into the two latches that looked like modified carabineers. She’d managed to fit it so that the bar’s hexagonal shape sat perfectly into the holsters. It was amazing that she could have done this in just one morning.

She looked up when he approached. He smiled awkwardly. Her eyes lingered on his bruise for a bit.

“Deal is a deal,” she said, “even though I got cheated on time.”

Jonathan ran his hand over the bike, gave the demolition bar a tug to see how stable it was in the holster. It was perfect. It would be able to stay in place while he rode but would come free when he reached for it.

“It’s great,” he said in genuine gratitude.

“Of course it is. You doubted me?” she asked.

“No, I didn’t,” he said.

He was at a loss as to what else to say. The previous night loomed between them.

“Jack hasn’t stopped talking all morning about how you knocked Paige’s boyfriend out,” Leah said.

Startled at first, Jonathan grew a little embarrassed. Had the kid been up late enough to have witnessed what happened? Hadn’t the babysitter put him to bed?

As though reading his mind, Leah explained, “That ass was yelling so loudly when they got back he woke up half the block. Jack is a light sleeper.” She pointed to the balcony, where she’d been sitting the night Jonathan had drowned the Ferox. “I had a pretty good view myself.”

He followed her finger and nodded. It hadn’t occurred to him. He’d been nervous about Grant yelling at the top of his lungs, but only in a general way. He had no idea what Leah would think of what she’d heard and seen.

“I’m sorry Jack saw that,” Jonathan said.

She approached him, reaching for his face just as Paige had, tilting it to get a better look at the black eye. He stiffened at first, reminded by her touch just how beautiful a woman she was. He tried to relax, let her survey the damage. If there was ever an upside to the bruise, it was that it gave her a reason to put her hands on him.

“I’m sorry he saw it, too,” she said, still holding his face, “but I’d be lying if I said I was sorry I saw it.”

She took her hand back, had it lingered a moment longer, her touch might have confessed something other than concern. He hadn’t minded; he missed the connection immediately.

“Paige is mad at herself,” Jonathan said. “We were all caught off guard last night. I’m sorry I left like I did.”

Leah raised an eyebrow.

“I didn’t take it personally. It was pretty clear that he’d…” She paused. “Known what buttons to push.”

“Yeah,” Jonathan said, “he did.”

“Everyone’s got at least one,” she said. Then her face changed from a look of sympathy to one of curiosity. He thought he knew what was going on in her head. She was weighing the urge to mind her own business with the stronger urge to ask personal questions. He knew she would end up asking, but still, he liked that she always thought about it before she did.

“Any idea why he would be instructed to infiltrate the Tibbs entourage?” she asked.

“Oh,” Jonathan said, “well, I think that’s why Paige is so mad at herself.”

“I don’t follow,” she said.

“She thinks Grant was discharged from the army early because of mental health problems,” Jonathan said.

“Oh, she thinks he was a nut case,” Leah replied. “Is that what you think?”

Jonathan shrugged.

“It’s what everyone seemed to think at breakfast,” he said.

She looked at him conspiratorially. He wasn’t fooling her, and he knew it. She saw right away that he had side-stepped the real question. It was not the first time it had occurred to him he should be more careful around her. She was too perceptive. It was just so attractive a trait that it disarmed him before he could remember how dangerous it was. He needed to watch what he betrayed. He needed to commit to his lies, but he struggled, because no part of him really wanted to.

Jonathan looked down at the bike to break away from that look. Testing how it functioned with the alteration in place; he swung his leg over and sat into the suspension. The fit was good, though his left leg had to make room for the demolition bar, it wouldn’t bother him while he was riding.